Digital Bill Payment & Presentment value to exceed USD 2 trillion globally in 2021, higher than the UK’s Entire 2020 GDP

A new study from Juniper Research has found that the global transaction value of digital bill payment and presentment will exceed $2 trillion by the end of 2021, from $1.9 trillion in 2020. Digital bill payment and presentment are accessed and paid digitally, primarily through mobile banking apps. This steady growth represents the increasing maturity of the market, which is struggling for new user adoption.

The research predicts that, while digital bill payment is well established with traditional banks, digital-only banks will increasingly expand their presently limited offerings to mirror these capabilities, aiming to broaden their revenue streams. As such, digital billing services will need to prioritise partnerships with these digital-only banks, in order to access the best sources of future user growth.

Smartphones Dominate Usage

The new research, Digital Banking: Banking-as-a-Service, Market Transformation & Forecasts 2021 2026, found that smartphone-based digital bill payment and presentment will account for 51% of total digital bill payments in 2021, rising to almost 57% in 2026; displacing online management via browsers. The report identified the ubiquity of banking apps, with the new API opportunities unlocked via open banking being critical to expanding billing reach into a much broader market; widening this ecosystem significantly.

Research co-author Damla Sat explained: “Success in digital bill payment and presentment is about ensuring the right connections to billers are in place. The rise of APIs raises new possibilities for rapidly expanding this ecosystem; making partnerships critical at this early stage.”

US is Single Largest Digital Bill Payment Market

The research found that the US will be the single largest digital bill payment and presentment market throughout the next five years; accounting for almost 35% of all digital bill payment transactions by value in 2021. The study recommends that banks in Europe and Asia Pacific must partner with bill payment and presentment vendors with the most extensive third-party connections to billers to drive usage.